Did you have standing water there?

@dchall
-That area of the yard is always pretty barren compared to the rest, but it doesn't seem nearly as brown in the early spring/late fall. It looks the worst during the summer months. During the winter the whole yard turns mostly tan when it goes dormant, with some green blades mixed in.
- I haven't measured yet, so i'll make sure to do the watering test on both the good and dead areas to compare.
- I did see the shampoo idea in several of the threads that I was searching through, I'm going to give that a shot too.
- Just to make sure I understood right, were you saying that the brown area is KBG and the green is Fescue, or were you saying that if it turns brown in winter it's KBG and if it stays green in winter it's Fescue?

@Julian
No, never had any standing water in any part of the lawn. Even a month back when we had heavy rains for several days in a row, it seems to drain normally.

Hey Mark, Any update to this old post? I have the exact problem right now and I'm having a hard time identifying the issue and treating it. Thanks,

Yep, so after measuring the water my lawn was getting, it was lower in that area than other parts of the lawn, mostly because it was only covered by sprinklers rotating 180-270 degrees, and most other areas had a few only rotating 90 degrees. Anyway, I ended up switching to a watering schedule of slightly less time but every day instead of 3 times a week and it helped tremendously. My problem was definitely that area not getting enough water, but it wasn't apparent because all sprinklers were working properly.

Uh, that was the wrong solution, Mark. Watering more frequently is never the right answer. The solution was/is to adjust or replace the sprinklers to get even coverage. THEN to reduce the frequency and up the time until you're getting 1 inch of water all at one time and not spread out with 1/7" of water every day. Watering once a week might be right or once every 10 to 14 days, but watering every day is not right.

I'm sure your probably right. I've read that most places I look. It might have just been a combination of clay in the soil and the hot dry climate here, but even after I adjusted the watering time on that sector to match up with the rest, my yard was still struggling during the summer months. I asked some work colleagues and neighbors that had nice lawns what their secret was, and every one of them was watering daily for a shorter period. When I tried it, it made my yard green within a few weeks and it worked great for a couple years before we moved. I'm aware this is normally a prime way to create weak roots for your grass, but in that area it seemed to be the only way to keep the grass alive for those few summer months. Since Then I've moved to another nearby city in Utah with better soil and it works great watering less often, but it wasn't working in that area.

Here's something else to consider. This lawn...

That lawn belongs to bpgreen, a Salt Lake City resident and formerly a very active participant in this forum. It is comprised of various wheatgrasses (Western, Streambank, and Crested), blue grama, and a little strawberry clover. There is also some residue of KBG in there, which is what he started with. This lawn goes without supplemental water until about June. Then his lawn care program starts. He mows once per month and waters about once per month for the rest of the growing season. I believe he fertilizes once per year in the fall. It doesn't get any easier than that and the results are pretty darned nice.

You don't have to add the clover if you don't want to. His thinking was that clover returns nitrogen to the soil and he would never have to fertilize. I'm not sure how that worked out for him, but I could find out if you're interested in introducing the clover (weed) to your yard.

If you water 1" at a time, but 95%+ of the water becomes surface runoff because of soil conditions, how do you recommend managing that? The turf is still going to end up with drought stress.

I mean I've seen some recommendations where you water until runoff, wait, repeat, until 1" is absorbed (so, light and frequent, all at once), but besides that?

Topdress/fertilize with organic matter to absorb moisture and eventually soften up the soil, or aeration or...?

I just had that potential problem (I know, First World Issues) as we've had a bit of a dry spell and are expecting flash flood storms tonight and tomorrow.

I pre-sprayed with soil conditioner (homemade, essentially the easiest and closest repro of what I use done on the cheap is any inexpensive shampoo sprayed on the lawn at 2 ounces per thousand square feet, diluted well in water in a hose-end sprayer).

Yep. It fiddles with the water absorption just like it fiddles with water tension (and because it fiddles with water tension...) and will make those storms absorb instead of running off down the swale.

My soil is already high in organic material, has a thick and well-grown-in lawn, and went into the dry spell over 4" long. I was ready, quite apart from what the complaints on another thread seem to think. :-)

Over the long-term, add as much organic material as you can. Mulch mow the lawn as tall as you can stand it (most grass types except Bermuda and bentgrass). Use said above formula a few times a year. Get your soil tested and balance the resources to make the lawn as thick and healthy as possible (it will manage its own root systems, which slough off OM by the pound all by themselves).

And, as you said, stagger watering to let it absorb and then start up again to avoid runoff that's just wasting your money (or water table if you're on a well).

Agree with morph on water penetration. I did not believe shampoo would work, but I found several (many?) university studies using surfactants on golf courses. They generally found that the surfactant, Cascade Plus (no relation to dishwashing Cascade), worked as well as aeration for improving water penetration on hydrophobic turf. Well, Cascade Plus runs about $70 per gallon and then you have to dilute it. Morpheuspa is a soap specialist in addition to lawn guru, and he came up with a concoction of chemicals which are similar to those found in shampoo. I tried shampoo and it worked for me...just as all the others on that lawn care forum had been reporting for months. I applied at 3 ounces per 1,000 but I believe morph has tested it at an order of magnitude more than that, so 2, 3, 10, 20...it makes no difference. Spray at 2 ounces and see if it works. If it didn't seem to work after 3 weeks, spray again. After you spray the shampoo follow it up with a deep watering. That one watering might require the on and off routine you mentioned, but after that it will be much improved. I sprayed it in 2012 on the lawn in San Antonio and when we moved in 2015, it was still extremely soft to walk on after a rain. The one thing that does make a difference is shampoos with conditioners. Conditioners make shampoo cloudy, so use a clear shampoo. I use baby shampoo but you can find clear shampoos at Dollar Tree for a dollar.

Why does shampoo work (you might be asking)? Certainly the shampoo allows water penetration more easily and to a deeper level in the soil. Beyond that, the deeper water down into cooler soil levels helps to set up the perfect environment for the beneficial fungi which will soften and open your soil for you. These guys are like bread mold. After a few days in the perfect environment, they will fill the soil just like they fill the bread bag. When they become moist they swell slightly and push soil particles apart. When they dry out, they shrink slightly allowing air to penetrate. The next time it rains or you irrigate, these open air channels become the water channels to refill the deeper soil levels. So in addition to the physical structural component that surfactants provide, I believe the biological contribution cannot be overlooked.